Some of the more common soil contaminants are chlorinated hydrocarbons (CFH), heavy metals (such as chromium, cadmium--found in rechargeable batteries, and lead--found in lead paint, aviation fuel and still in some countries, gasoline), MTBE, zinc, arsenic and benzene. Ordinary municipal landfills are the source of many chemical substances entering the soil environment (and often groundwater), emanating from the wide variety of refuse accepted, especially substances illegally discarded there, or from pre-1970 landfills that may have been subject to little control in the U.S. or EU. There have also been some unusual releases of polychlorinated dibenzodioxins, commonly called dioxins for simplicity, such as TCDD.
Pollution can also be the consequence of a natural disaster. For example, hurricanes often involve water contamination from sewage, and petrochemical spills from ruptured boats or automobiles. Larger scale and environmental damage is not uncommon when coastal oil rigs or refineries are involved. Some sources of pollution, such as nuclear power plants or oil tankers, can produce widespread and potentially hazardous releases when accidents occur.
In the case of noise pollution the dominant source class is the motor vehicle, producing about ninety percent of all unwanted noise worldwide.
[ A total of 141 countries have ratified the agreement. Notable exceptions include the United States and Australia, who have signed but not ratified the agreement. The stated reason for the United States not ratifying is the exemption of large emitters of greenhouse gases who are also developing countries, like China and India.][News] Pollution suit settled over Sheboygan County plant
Associated Press - October 30, 2008 11:25 PM ET MADISON, Wis. (AP) - State Justice Department officials report a settlement of a pollution lawsuit targeting a whey processing plant in Sheboygan...
An UN environmental conference held in Bali 3 - 14 December 2007 with the participation from 180 countries aims to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which will end in 2012. During the first day of the conference USA, Saudi Arabia and Canada were presented with the "Fossil-of-the-day-award", a symbolic bag of coal for their negative impact on the global climate. The bags included the flags of the respective countries. [ Fossil-of-the-Day Awards at UN Climate Change Negotiations]
[Image] 
About sea pollution, for children's book.
China
China's rapid industrialization has substantially increased pollution. China has some relevant regulations: the 1979 Environmental Protection Law, which was largely modelled on U.S. legislation. But the environment continues to deteriorate.[ China covers up pollution deaths][Video] "REALEST LIFE" Youth Documentary Series (Part 1)
Europe
The United Kingdom
In the 1840s, the United Kingdom brought onto the statute books legislation to control water pollution. It was extended to all rivers and coastal water by 1961. However, currently the clean up of historic contamination is controlled under a specific statutory scheme found in Part IIA of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 (Part IIA), as inserted by the Environment Act 1995, and other ‘rules’ found in regulations and statutory guidance. The Act came into force in England in April 2000.[Auction] Early Air Pollution Studies Coal Fired Boiler Plants ++
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Within the current regulatory framework, Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC) is a regime for controlling pollution from certain industrial activities. The regime introduces the concept of Best Available Techniques ("BAT") to environmental regulations. Operators must use the BAT to control pollution from their industrial activities to prevent, and where that is not practicable, to reduce to acceptable levels, pollution to air, land and water from industrial activities. The Best Available Techniques also aim to balance the cost to the operator against benefits to the environment.The system of Pollution Prevention and Control is replacing that of Integrated Pollution Control (IPC) (which was established by the Environmental Protection Act 1990) and is taking effect between 2000 and 2007. The Pollution Prevention and Control regime implements the European Directive (EC/96/61) on integrated pollution prevention and control.
[Post] The top ten world’s worst pollution problems report
The Blacksmith Institute, in collaboration with Green Cross Switzerland, recently released a report titled The World’s Worst Pollution Problems. The top ten problems, detailed in this report, include, in first place, artisanal gold ...
United States
The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established threshold standards for air pollutants to protect human health on January 1, 1970. One of the ratings chemicals are given is carcinogenicity. In addition to the classification "unknown", designated levels range from non-carcinogen, to likely and known carcinogen. Some scientists have said that the concentrations which most of these levels indicate are far too high and the exposure of people should be less. In 1999, the United States EPA replaced the Pollution Standards Index (PSI) with the Air Quality Index (AQI) to incorporate new PM2.5 and Ozone standards. between Colorado Springs and Pueblo, Colorado.]]The United States Congress passed the Clean Air Act in 1963 to legislate the reduction of smog and atmospheric pollution in general. That legislation has subsequently been amended and extended in 1966, 1970, 1977 and 1990. Numerous state and local governments have enacted similar legislation either implementing or filling in locally important gaps in the national program. The national Clean Air Act and similar state legislative acts have led to the widespread use of atmospheric dispersion modeling[ www.air-dispersion.com] in order to analyze the air quality impacts of proposed major actions.[Book] Air Pollution Control (3rd Edition) Waveland Press
Passage of the Clean Water Act amendments of 1977 required strict permitting for any contaminant discharge to navigable waters, and also required use of best management practices for a wide range of other water discharges including thermal pollution.
[Site] Pollution
Pollution is the addition to the ecosystem of someting which has a detrimental effect on it. ... Noise pollution or unwanted sounds that are carried by the air, ...
www.botany.uwc.ac.za/sci_ed/grade10/ecology/conservation/poll.htm
Passage of the Noise Control Act established mechanisms of setting emission standards for virtually every source of noise including motor vehicles, aircraft, certain types of HVAC equipment and major appliances. It also put local government on notice as to their responsibilities in land use planning to address noise mitigation. This noise regulation framework comprised a broad data base detailing the extent of noise health effects.
[News] Gurgaon records less pollution on Diwali
Chandigarh, Oct 31 : The pollution level in Gurgaon city recorded a decrease of about 15 per cent during this Diwali as compared to last year.
The state of California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has maintained an independent list of substances with product labeling requirements as part of Proposition 65 since 1986.
[Image] 
Photo of a stranded oil drum on the west coast of Vancouver Island, unneeded Ocean Pollution, British Columbia, Canada.
With the 1990 Clean Air Act, the EPA began a controversial carbon trading system in which tradable rights to emit a specified level of carbon are granted to polluters.
[Video] Polluted Landscapes
The United States has a maximum fine of US$25,000 for dumping toxic waste.
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Canada
In Canada the regulation of pollution and its effects are monitored by a number of organizations depending on the nature of the pollution and its location. The three levels of governemnt (Federal - Canada Wide; Provincial; and Municipal) equally share in the responsibilities, and in the monitoring and correction of pollution.[Post] noise pollution
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For the Air there is the organization "Environment Canada", and for specific provincial duties, there are the respective branches of the Provincial entities that deal with areas such as potable water, Oceans, and the Natural Resources of the lands and waters.
[Book] Atmospheric Pollution Cambridge University Press
All together quite a hodgepodge of offices
[Site] Pollution Prevention | US EPA
The Pollution Prevention (P2) web site provides general information about P2 ... Pollution prevention (P2) is reducing or eliminating waste at the source by ...
www.epa.gov/p2
There are laws and regulations written for the Air, Water, and Soil, but these are subject to change at any given time depending on the Government of the Day.
[News] Utah begins pollution monitoring for winter months
Posted: 11:52 AM- Starting this weekend, state officials will be on the lookout for unhealthy pollution in the air.
Currently Adding entries as they pop up with external links and references.
[Image] 
Conservation above ground affects conservation underground
History
Prehistory
Humankind has some effect upon the environment since the Paleolithic era during which the ability to generate fire was acquired. In the Iron Age, the use of tooling led to the practice of metal grinding on a small scale and resulted in minor accumulations of discarded material probably easily dispersed without too much impact. Human wastes would have polluted rivers or water sources to some degree. However, these effects could be expected predominantly to be dwarfed by the natural world.[Video] Pollution
Ancient cultures
The first advanced civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, China, Persia, Greece and Rome increased the use of water for their manufacture of goods, increasingly forged metal and created fires of wood and peat for more elaborate purposes (for example, bathing, heating). Still, at this time the scale of higher activity did not disrupt ecosystems or greatly alter air or water quality.[Auction] NEW Disney DVD.. BILL NYE The Science Guy POLLUTION...
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Middle Ages
The European Dark Ages during the early Middle Ages were a great boon for the environment, in that industrial activity fell, and population levels did not grow rapidly. Toward the end of the Middle Ages populations grew and concentrated more within cities, creating pockets of readily evident contamination. In certain places air pollution levels were recognizable as health issues, and water pollution in population centers was a serious medium for disease transmission from untreated human waste.[Post] ?Water Pollution Solutions
Water pollution has become a big problem is America and other countries around the world. Even though there are strong laws that have been set up as water pollution solutions to help prevent further pollution from taking place, ...
Since travel and widespread information were less common, there did not exist a more general context than that of local consequences in which to consider pollution. Foul air would have been considered a nuissance and wood, or eventually, coal burning produced smoke, which in sufficient concentrations could be a health hazard in proximity to living quarters. Septic contamination or poisoning of a clean drinking water source was very easily fatal to those who depended on it, especially if such a resource was rare. Superstitions predominated and the extent of such concerns would probably have been little more than a sense of moderation and an avoidance of obvious extremes.
[Book] Air Pollution Engineering Manual Wiley-Interscience
Official acknowledgement
But gradually increasing populations and the proliferation of basic industrial processes saw the emergence of a civilization that began to have a much greater collective impact on its surroundings. It was to be expected that the beginnings of environmental awareness would occur in the more developed cultures, particularly in the densest urban centers. The first medium warranting official policy measures in the emerging western world would be the most basic: the air we breathe.[Site] Pollution Online
Offers news, resources, and business listings for the prevention industry.
www.pollutiononline.com
The earliest known writings concerned with pollution were Arabic medical treatises written between the 9th and 13th centuries, by physicians such as al-Kindi (Alkindus), Qusta ibn Luqa (Costa ben Luca), Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi (Rhazes), Ibn Al-Jazzar, al-Tamimi, al-Masihi, Ibn Sina (Avicenna), Ali ibn Ridwan, Ibn Jumay, Isaac Israeli ben Solomon, Abd-el-latif, Ibn al-Quff, and Ibn al-Nafis. Their works covered a number of subjects related to pollution such as air contamination, water contamination, soil contamination, solid waste mishandling, and environmental assessments of certain localities.[L. Gari (2002), "Arabic Treatises on Environmental Pollution up to the End of the Thirteenth Century", Environment and History 8 (4), pp. 475-488.]
[News] Australia still plans to tax pollution from 2010
(AP:CANBERRA, Australia) Australia will forge ahead with a plan to tax carbon pollution from 2010 despite the current economic downturn, Treasurer Wayne Swan said Thursday as he released a reassuring assessment of the scheme.
King Edward I of England banned the burning of sea-coal by proclamation in London in 1272, after its smoke had become a problem.
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It was the industrial revolution that gave birth to environmental pollution as we know it today. The emergence of great factories and consumption of immense quantities of coal and other fossil fuels gave rise to unprecedented air pollution and the large volume of industrial chemical discharges added to the growing load of untreated human waste. Chicago and Cincinnati were the first two American cities to enact laws ensuring cleaner air in 1881. Other cities followed around the country until early in the 20th century, when the short lived Office of Air Pollution was created under the Department of the Interior. Extreme smog events were experienced by the cities of Los Angeles and Donora, Pennsylvania in the late 1940s, serving as another public reminder.
[Video] KOHD-TV Investigates Toxics in Oregonians' Bodies
Modern awareness
Pollution began to draw major public attention in the United States between the mid-1950s and early 1970s, when Congress passed the Noise Control Act, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.[Auction] FDC #1411 CANCELLED 10/28/1970 ANTI-POLLUTION
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Bad bouts of local pollution helped increase consciousness. PCB dumping in the Hudson River resulted in a ban by the EPA on consumption of its fish in 1974. Long-term dioxin contamination at Love Canal starting in 1947 became a national news story in 1978 and led to the Superfund legislation of 1980. Legal proceedings in the 1990s helped bring to light Chromium-6 releases in California--the champions of whose victims became famous. The pollution of industrial land gave rise to the name brownfield, a term now common in city planning. DDT was banned in most of the developed world after the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring.
[Post] Well the pollution made some pretty colors!
Well the pollution made some pretty colors!
The development of nuclear science introduced radioactive contamination, which can remain lethally radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. Lake Karachay, named by the Worldwatch Institute as the "most polluted spot" on earth, served as a disposal site for the Soviet Union thoroughout the 1950s and 1960s. Second place may go to the to the area of Chelyabinsk U.S.S.R. (see reference below) as the "Most polluted place on the planet".
[Book] Fundamentals of Air Pollution, Fourth Edition Academic Press
Nuclear weapons continued to be tested in the Cold War, sometimes near inhabited areas, especially in the earlier stages of their development. The toll on the worst-affected populations and the growth since then in understanding about the critical threat to human health posed by radioactivity has also been a prohibitive complication associated with nuclear power. Though extreme care is practiced in that industry, the potential for disaster suggested by incidents such as those at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl pose a lingering specter of public mistrust. One legacy of nuclear testing before most forms were banned has been significantly raised levels of background radiation.
[Site] Pollution - MSN Encarta
Pollution, contamination of Earth's environment with materials that interfere with human health, the quality of life, or the natural functioning of.
encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761570933/Pollution.html
International catastrophes such as the wreck of the Amoco Cadiz oil tanker off the coast of Brittany in 1978 and the Bhopal disaster in 1984 have demonstrated the universality of such events and the scale on which efforts to address them needed to engage. The borderless nature of the atmosphere and oceans inevitably resulted in the implication of pollution on a planetary level with the issue of global warming. Most recently the term persistent organic pollutant (POP) has come to describe a group of chemicals such as PBDEs and PFCs among others. Though their effects remain somewhat less well understood owing to a lack of experimental data, they have been detected in various ecological habitats far removed from industrial activity such as the Arctic, demonstrating diffusion and bioaccumulation after only a relatively brief period of widespread use.
[News] Salvage Yard Owner Fined $100,000 For Pollution
CONCORD, N.H. -- A salvage yard owner in Windsor, N.H., has been fined $100,000 for polluting groundwater on his property. A judge imposed the fine on George Brooks after the state alleged he caused the pollution by discharging oil and gasoline.
Growing evidence of local and global pollution and an increasingly informed public over time have given rise to environmentalism and the environmental movement, which generally seek to limit human impact on the environment.
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Philosophical recognition
Throughout history from Ancient Greece to Andalusia, Ancient China, central Europe during the Renaissance until today, philosophers ranging from Aristotle, Al-Farabi, Al-Ghazali, Averroes, Buddha, Confucius, Dante, Hegel, Avicenna, Lao Tse, Maimonedes, Montesquieu, Nussbaum, Plato, Socrates and Sun Tzu wrote about the pollution of the body as well as the mind and soul.[Video] Pollution and global warming
Perspectives
The earliest precursor of pollution generated by life forms would have been a natural function of their existence. The attendant consequences on viability and population levels fell within the sphere of natural selection. These would have included the demise of a population locally or ultimately, species extinction. Processes that were untenable would have resulted in a new balance brought about by changes and adaptations. At the extremes, for any form of life, consideration of pollution is superseded by that of survival.[Auction] American Empire, Anti-Pollution, Earth T-shirt
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For mankind, the factor of technology is a distinguishing and critical consideration, both as an enabler and an additional source of byproducts. Short of survival, human concerns include the range from quality of life to health hazards. Since science holds experimental demonstration to be definitive, modern treatment of toxicity or environmental harm involves defining a level at which an effect is observable. Common examples of fields where practical measurement is crucial include automobile emissions control, industrial exposure (eg Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) PELs), toxicology (eg LD50), and medicine (eg medication and radiation doses).
[Post] India opposes putting asbestos in hazardous list
UN hazardous chemical treaty faces deadlock at meeting in Rome “Government position is untenable” NEW DELHI: Reacting to the “anti-worker and anti-science” position of few “reckless governments” that has created a stalemate for the UN ...
"The solution to pollution is dilution", is a dictum which summarizes a traditional approach to pollution management whereby sufficiently diluted pollution is not harmful.
[Book] The Quest for Environmental Justice: Human Rights and the Politics of Pollution Sierra Club Books
Such simple treatment for environmental pollution on a wider scale might have had greater merit in earlier centuries when physical survival was often the highest imperative, human population and densities were lower, technologies were simpler and their byproducts more benign. But these are often no longer the case. Furthermore, advances have enabled measurement of concentrations not possible before. The use of statistical methods in evaluating outcomes has given currency to the principle of probable harm in cases where assessment is warranted but resorting to deterministic models is impractical or unfeasible. In addition, consideration of the environment beyond direct impact on human beings has gained prominence.
[Site] Pollution and Society
Pollution in our world effects two essential aspects of our planet: air and water. ... Air pollution is predominately emitted though the exhaust of motor vehicles and ...
www.umich.edu/~gs265/society/pollution.htm
Yet in the absence of a superseding principle, this older approach predominates practices throughout the world. It is the basis by which to gauge concentrations of effluent for legal release, exceeding which penalties are assessed or restrictions applied. The regressive cases are those where a controlled level of release is too high or, if enforceable, is neglected. Migration from pollution dilution to elimination in many cases is confronted by challenging economical and technological barriers.
[News] Eritrea: Minister Participates in Workshop On Combating Urban Pollution
The Minister of Land, Water and Environment, Mr. Woldenkiel Gebremariam, participated in a workshop on combating urban pollution that was held in Nairobi, Kenya, from October 21 to 22.
Controversies
Industry and concerned citizens have battled for decades over the significance of various forms of pollution. Salient parameters of these disputes are whether:[Image] 
The process of air pollution - model showing how the wind carries ozone to suburban areas
- a given pollutant affects all people or simply a genetically vulnerable set.
- an effect is only specific to certain species.
- whether the effect is simple, or whether it causes linked secondary and tertiary effects, especially on biodiversity
- an effect will only be apparent in the future and is presently negligible.
- the threshold for harm is present.
- the pollutant is of direct harm or is a precursor.
- employment or economic prosperity will suffer if the pollutant is abated.
[Video] Ten Percent: Human impacts on the environment
Blooms of algae and the resultant eutrophication of lakes and coastal ocean is considered pollution when it is caused by nutrients from industrial, agricultural, or residential runoff in either point source or nonpoint source form (see the article on eutrophication for more information).
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Heavy metals such as lead and mercury have a role in geochemical cycles and they occur naturally. These metals may also be mined and, depending on their processing, may be released disruptively in large concentrations into an environment they had previously been absent from. Just as the effect of anthropogenic release of these metals into the environment may be considered 'polluting', similar environmental impacts could also occur in some areas due to either autochthonous or historically 'natural' geochemical activity.
[Post] Letter: Pentin's advertising pollution
Much to my dismay, I awoke Saturday to the sound of a single engine airplane circling above my neighborhood. At first I just thought it was another passing airplane. When I noticed the same annoying noise recurring for about an hour, ...
Greenhouse gases and global warming
[[Image:CO2-by-country--1990-2025.png|thumb|Historical and projected CO2 emissions by country.
Source: Energy Information Administration.[ World Carbon Dioxide Emissions (Table 1, Report DOE/EIA-0573, 2004, Energy Information Administration)][ Carbon dioxide emissions chart (graph on Mongabay website page based on Energy Information Administration's tabulated data)]]][Book] Environmental and Pollution Science, Second Edition Academic Press
Carbon dioxide, while vital for photosynthesis, is sometimes referred to as pollution, because raised levels of the gas in the atmosphere are affecting the Earth's climate. Disruption of the environment can also highlight the connection between areas of pollution that would normally be classified separately, such as those of water and air. Recent studies have investigated the potential for long-term rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide to cause slight but critical increases in the acidity of ocean waters, and the possible effects of this on marine
[News] Citizens group may sue EPA over Bay pollution
Conservation, watermen and recreational fishing advocate groups, along with several retired politicians, announced this week they intend to go to federal court to force the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to require pollution reductions in the Chesapeake Bay.
[Image] 
Water pollution in the ocean
[Video] Eau Durable - Le SISA
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[Post] BPA, Air Pollution, and Baseball
Following a scientific advisory panel announcement yesterday that called FDA’s margins of safety for the chemical BPA “inadequate” NRDC has been at the forefront of BPA discussion in the news. Jen Sass appeared on NBC Nightly News last ...
[Book] Water Supply and Pollution Control (8th Edition) Prentice Hall
[News] Activists: New rules will mean more pollution
BP Whiting still would be allowed to dump more pollution into Lake Michigan if industries get to decide the rules, environmentalists say.
[Image] 
[Video] three rivers
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[Post] Urban Pollution Linked to High Levels of Ozone on Mt. Everest
Scientists have taken the first ozone measurement on the summit of Mount Everest and have found surprisingly high levels.
